Mice have been used as models in scientific investigations for decades, so that humans can deepen the understanding of human biology and diseases. Yet one question arises: why do rodents tend to be the most ubiquitous laboratory “guinea pig” for biomedical experiments?
Reproduction of Mice
One notable reason behind the use of mice in scientific labs is their high reproductive rate. According to the National Institutes of Health in 2010, mice are one of the quickest reproducing mammals on the planet. Mice are able to reach sexual maturity just six weeks after birth, and female mice are capable of conceiving every 2-3 weeks. Their fecundity allowed researchers to breed large numbers of mice quickly, inadvertently resulting in large sample populations for scientific experiments.
Affordability of Mice
The growth and housing for mice are also relatively low due to their miniature sizes. Usually, mice do not need vast amounts of space to roam around, and their food and other necessary supplies are often affordable, because they are mass produced at cheap prices. The combination of their high birth rates and low cost of handling have allowed lab experiments to be economical and sustainable globally.
Genetics of Mice
Mice are also perfect models for lab experiments due to their genetic material, which has a 95% similarity with the human genome. This high hereditary homology implies that mice also suffer many of the same diseases as humans, such as cancer, diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, and Alzheimer's, as well as mental disorders like anxiety.
Since the biology of mice operates so similarly to humans on a molecular degree, mice experience health problems in a manner that mirrors human problems. This allows researchers to examine how diseases occur and originate without using real human subjects.
Given the parallels in mice and human biology, such experiments allow scientists to explore the origins of diseases using mice samples. Additionally, researchers can explore how disorders or certain conditions affect the human body and develop therapies and treatments.
Ethics
While mice have enormously contributed to advancing scientific knowledge, the ethics of animal research cannot be ignored. Animal welfare is critical to ensure that mice are treated ethically and experience minimal pain. Committees such as the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committees (IACUCs) approve various protocols to regulate the ethics of such experiments. The ethics of mice and animal testing are still hot topics of disputes and debates.
Conclusion
In a nutshell, mice have been proven to be extremely valuable animal models for lab experiments due to their cheap but high reproduction rate and genetic resemblance to humans. These traits have hence standardized mice as mainstream test subjects for preclinical trialing, disease modeling and physiology imaging.
Looking into the future, current efforts to map and image the mice genome could further enhance their value as subjects to investigate and simulate existing genetic disorders that currently lack understanding. Scientists continue to work to advance human understanding while considering the ethics of their practices.
Works Cited
Bryda, E.C. (2013). The Mighty Mouse: the impact of rodents on advances in biomedical research. Missouri Medicine, [online] 110(3), pp.207–11. Available at: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3987984/ [Accessed 2 Apr. 2024].
Maxwell, A. (2016). Why do scientists use mice? | Blood.ca. [online] www.blood.ca. Available at:https://www.blood.ca/en/research/our-research-stories/research-education-discovery/why-do-scientists-use-mice-medical.
Oladimeji, E. (2023). How do mouse studies relate to human health? [online] Medicalnewstoday.com. Available at: https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/mouse-studies#summary [Accessed 2 Apr. 2024].
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